People with hearing loss face two perennial problems. First, of course, is the obvious: a diminished capacity to hear that which those with normal hearing can easily decipher. Second and less obvious is that the more common hearing assistive devices, namely hearing aids, are typically not compatible with many devices that transmit or emit audio. For example, a person who wears a hearing aid throughout his or her waking hours may find the hearing aid is useless or even causes discomfort when he or she tries to operate, interface with, or otherwise use audio producing devices such as radios, telephones, electronic file players, ear phones, headsets, and the like. In such situations the hearing aid user's present choices are generally limited to using uniquely designed audio producing devices, using a standard audio producing device with a different hearing assistive device, or avoiding the standard audio producing device altogether.
Alternatives to hearing aids are known. For example, teletypewriters and closed-captioned systems have been developed, both of which permit the hearing impaired to read that which would otherwise be spoken. Another alternative to hearing aids are assistive listening devices (ALD). An ALD is an attempt to improve the individual listening experience, and these include FM systems, infrared systems, and induction loop systems.
Attempts to improve the listening experience of those with hearing loss are driven by market and social factors, including increased interaction with audio emitting devices, increased life-span coupled with naturally decreasing hearing abilities, and government mandates. With regard to the latter, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law in 1990. The ADA requires public services and buildings to make reasonable accommodations to allow access to persons with disabilities, including those with hearing loss. Many large corporations with numerous employees are sometimes known to voluntary integrate ADA requirements. Alternatively, such entities are sometimes considered to be providing a public service for purposes of the ADA, and are required to comply.
Because hearing aids are so popular there have been many attempts to make hearing aids compatible with other audio equipped communication devices. For example, some attempts provide mechanical solutions such as ear shrouds and ear cups around speakers that are held close to the user's ear. Other attempts include devices with adjustable gain, and devices that permit a standard earpiece speaker to be replaced by a unique earpiece speaker suitable for a particular user. Still further attempts include creating a shield around the audio transmitting device to reduce or eliminate radio frequency interference. All of these attempts appear to have narrow application or are directed to a device that is then usable only by a unique individual.
More recently, driven by the dramatic shift in telecommunications away from the hard-wired telephone to the wireless or cellular telephone, incompatibility with audio emitting devices in the form of cell phones is an issue that increasingly plagues hearing aid users. Interference by cell phones with hearing aids in the audio range can be caused by RF emissions, display backlighting, display strobing, and processor noise in any electronic device including a cell phone. In addition, acoustic feedback often results when any audio emitting device is brought close to a hearing aid.
Various parties including hearing aid designers and manufacturers, specialty audio equipment manufacturers, cellular telephone manufacturers, wireless telecommunication service provides, and even ALD designers are presently attempting solutions to the increased problem of hearing aid compatibility within the context of wireless telecommunications. Some attempts to solve the problem of hearing aid compatibility as it regards cell phones have been at the macro level, such as regulating power to the base station transmitter in an effort to avoid introducing harmonics in the audio frequencies. Other attempts have been at a micro-level, for instance, introducing an intermediate low frequency device between the cell phone and user that attempts to reduce interference in the hearing aid due to transmission of the wireless telephone. Still other attempts have been directed to the individual cell phone, for example, providing smart cards to configure the audio output of electronic devices, including cell phones.
A review of the known art confirms that a comprehensive solution to the problem of providing an improved listening experience to the hearing impaired remains elusive. A comprehensive solution would allow a hearing impaired user to successfully operate, interface with, or otherwise use an audio producing device. In addition, a comprehensive solution would provide entities who wish as well as those under government mandate with a way to economically accommodate those with hearing loss. Further, a comprehensive solution would provide audio producing systems that can be used seamlessly by people of all hearing abilities.